THE RIGHT TIME FOR J. D.

On the surface, it looks like the Red Sox got J. D. Martinez at just the right time in his career. He started the 2017 season with the Detroit Tigers and was traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks on July 18. He had missed the first 33 games of the season after suffering a sprain in his right foot in Spring Training.

After coming back, he played 119 of the two teams’ 129 remaining games, a larger percentage of his teams’ games than he had played in any of his seven seasons with the exception of 2015, when he played 158 games for the Tigers. In his 119 games, he hit 45 home runs and drove in 104 runs while posting a .303 batting average and a .690 slugging percentage which was the highest average in the Majors but he did not have enough at bats to qualify for number one.

Forty-five home runs in 119 games is the equivalent of 61 home runs in a 162 game season and 104 RBI’s is the equivalent of 142 over the whole season. In addition to playing more than he usually does, he was more productive than he had ever been.

Martinez, as I am sure every Red Sox fan knows, was signed by the Sox on Monday of last week as a Free Agent for five years at $110. million. He is a 30 year old right handed hitting, outfielder/designated hitter that everyone expects will take over the role of DH in the Sox lineup to fill the hole that has exited since David Ortiz retired at the end of the 2016 season.

His doing so will allow the Sox to platoon the right handed hitting Hanley Ramirez and left handed hitting Mitch Moreland at first base. Neither of those two were very productive last year. Moreland hit .246 with 22 homers and 79 runs batted in, just about his average over the past five years, after a good start. Ramirez, who had hit. 286 with 30 homers and 111 RBI’s in 2016, fell of to a .242 batting average and 62 RBI’s. If one of the two should have a good year, the other may get lost in the shuffle. Ramirez can opt out of his contract and become a Free Agent in 2019 if he gets less than 497 at bats and the Sox may want that to happen to free up his salary to use to retain other players.

This may have to be the year the Red Sox make their move to go all the way as anyone who thinks that the young nucleus of this club, Betts, Bogaerts, Bradley, Vazquez and company are all going to be here for many more years does not understand the lure of Free Agency that will be facing them all soon.

This week, the man that I think of as ‘The Idiot in the Commissioner’s Office’ announced his latest attempts to tinker with the game of baseball, which he appears to know less about than a young Tee Ball player.

In an attempt to speed up play, he and his Pace of the Game Committee have convinced the Major League Baseball Player’s Association to agree to changes in the rules which will take effect at the start of the 2018 season.

Manager’s, Coaches and players will be limited to a maximum of six visits to the mound during each nine inning game. If a game goes into extra innings, one additional visit will be allowed for each inning. These six visits will not include trips for purposes of cleaning cleats on rainy days, injuries or visits caused by an offensive substitution. It will not include communication from players to pitchers if either does not leave his normal position. Umpires will also be allowed to grant an exception where a catcher and pitcher have gotten crossed up on a sign.

Breaks between innings will be limited to 2 minutes five seconds for locally televised games, 2 minutes 25 seconds for nationally televised games and 2 minutes 55 seconds for tie breaker or post season games. The pitcher will not be limited to eight warmup pitches between innings but the amount he gets will be limited to the amount he can throw up to 20 seconds before the start of play. The pitcher must deliver the first pitch and the batter must be ready for it before the end of the break. The timing above applies to relief pitchers as well and the time starts when the pitcher crosses the warning track on his way in.

Given the fact that baseball’s previous attempts to make a pitcher deliver a pitch in a timely fashion have failed because of the umpires inability or unwillingness to impose penalties, this will probably fail, too. The next step will probably involve some other stupid idea like setting up time clocks in the dug outs, bull pens and batter’s box so that players can sign in.

Trying to fix some of the problems caused by lengthy instant replay delays, each team will be provided with slow motion cameras in the club house and telephones between the clubhouse and the dugout to relay information about questionable calls. Of course, because the communications systems could be used for sign stealing, all calls will be recorded.

If the instant replay system, which slows down the pace of play, were never started, we wouldn’t have to worry about this. What would have been wrong with leaving baseball as the one place where the technological explosion did not rear its ugly head?

On Wednesday of this week, John Healy, reported in the New York Daily News that, according to Rich Eisen, on his radio show, said “an MLB executive told him of an idea about allowing the manager of the trailing team to bat whomever he chooses in the ninth inning in an effort to ramp up more excitement.”

“Baseball is the only sport by mere randomness and happenstance, the best players are not out on the field with the game on the line,” Eisen said. “Potentially down by two, ninth inning, you got 7-8-9 up.”

There have been some ludicrous ideas disguised as methods to make the game more exciting but this one literally takes the cake. Get ready because the next idea may be participation trophies for everybody who doesn’t make the playoffs to keep the weaker teams’ fans excited and involved.

On a brighter note, here we are on February 25th, just 32 days from the Red Sox opening game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Tropicana Field and things look a lot better for the Sox than they did a week ago.